


Not a Thing

by analogized, quigonejinn



Category: Luther (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - BDSM, Kidnapping, Multi, Rape/Non-con Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-21
Updated: 2014-11-06
Packaged: 2018-02-22 00:54:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2488412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/analogized/pseuds/analogized, https://archiveofourown.org/users/quigonejinn/pseuds/quigonejinn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Justin is angry at himself for being surprised at who Alice Morgan thinks he belongs to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For the longest time, I swore that this was not something I was actually going to write. Then the lovely quigonejinn happened.
> 
> Herein lies (or will lie) varying degrees of unpleasantness, gross consent issues, kidnapping, graphic violence and institutionalized sexism and more.

Here's how it goes:

Tom Marwood shoots Justin Ripley in the chest.

The round pulls to the right, and Ripley goes down - open pneumothorax, chest splintered like mince meat, blood a fine mist over the surrounding cobblestones.

He survives because it isn’t a direct shot to the heart, because John Luther calls an ambulance, tries to create a seal over the worst of the gaping hole with his bare hands until the paramedics arrive, while Justin wheezes out blood and tells him to leave and give chase.

Tom Marwood escapes, and kills George Stark, wounds Erin Gray trying to get to Mary Day in a safe house he shouldn't have known existed.

John Luther facilitates Alice Morgan's escape from a locked police van, and subsequently has a warrant issued for his arrest - top priority.

*

Justin Ripley is the first born of five in a working class family, to a Dom father and a sub mother, ten months after the wedding.

He’s expected to turn out a Dom - solid young lad, energetic, attentive to the needs of those around him. He grows up with the value of doing right by the people who belong to you drummed in, over and over, in the way he deals with his siblings - Charlotte, David, Olivia and Elizabeth (or Betsy, as she’s been known since she was all of two minutes old) - in the way he’s expected to help his mum around the house, in the way he’s told to always be fair but firm to everyone, regardless of orientation. The Ripley family are not overtly traditional, believe in a fair go and equality to everyone willing to pull their weight, don’t believe there’s anything wrong with male subs or switches or the non-dynamic as long as you’re still a decent person.

As the oldest, and the first born son, there’s just the assumption that Justin will turn out to be a Dom.

It doesn't quite work out like that.

His orientation paperwork comes back with a neatly stamped little s, blotted with a little too much ink on the page, a few weeks after he turns 12. 

Nothing much changes. He’s still the oldest, still helps mum look after his siblings - Charlotte 10, David 9, Olivia 6 and Betsy at 3 - still goes on to do his GSCE, and is still the first Ripley to do their A Levels - 3, decent but not fantastic marks.

Justin Ripley joins the Met at 19, fresh out of school, and when he’s 32, he takes a round to the chest in pursuit of a vigilante killer who expect Justin's knees to bend because he asks in the right tone of voice.

*

Justin wakes up four days later in the critical care unit, groggy and disoriented and unable to talk around the oxygen mask they have on him, a monster mishmash of tubes poking out of his chest. His brother David is by his bedside, and when Justin wakes up, he's crying silently, tears matting his eyelashes together.

Martin Schenk breaks the news: George Stark dead, Tom Marwood under heavy armed guard in the same hospital that Justin is in, three floors down. Erin Gray is in the same ward, across the hall and two doors down. With Stark dead and Erin wounded, worse than Justin, no current prognoses on when she might wake up, there is no way to prove the two counts of attempted murder that John Luther was charged with are untrue.

There's been an additional charge of aiding and abetting Alice Morgan added to his warrant.

Schenk touches Justin's hand as he says, _I'm so very sorry, son. You were very brave._

Schenk speaks to David in the corridor on the way out, and Justin tries to breathe as George Stark's words ring in his ears: _what is it about the people that John Luther loves._

*

His family flat out beg him to quit the police force.

Olivia and his mother cry. Charlotte doesn’t, and neither does Betsy, but Betsy’s eyes are a little wet as the family stands around his hospital bed, and she takes an entire day off her lectures to sit and read shitty tabloids out loud to him for hours on end. 

Justin's fairly sure it's intended as a form of torture. 

His dad claps him on the shoulder and looks vaguely guilty when Justin winces, and says lightly _maybe if you quit, you'd have more time to settle down, go into a quieter line of work._

His father has never told him to settle down, find a Dom, and even now, the suggestion hangs unsaid, awkward and heavy. 

*

He goes back to work as soon as the department will sign off on his medical all clear, and he's standing over a triple homicide, a dead Domme and her two subs, when Schenk arrives.

In an ideal world, Justin Ripley would get a promotion.

He doesn't, and the twist on Martin Schenk's face when they overhear one of the SOCCOs refer to him as Luther's boy tells him why.

Instead, Justin gets a department mandated round of physiotherapy and a standing appointment with a psychologist on Wednesday afternoons, and to stay in Serious & Serial.

The new DCI is a bit of a twat, but in the scheme of things, Justin understands that you get that, sometimes, don't you?

*

There's an investigation, of course. Two DCIs from IA come down, and start asking questions that make the entirety of Serious & Serial eye Justin nervously.

It may have something to do with the fact that Justin Ripley remains a staunch advocate that John Luther is an innocent man, obviously not guilty of all charges laid against him, and says so in the middle of the bullpen, the echo of his words to George Stark in a basement taking new form under the florescent lighting of the department.

An unpopular view to hold, especially since DCI Gray, who was passingly familiar to most, if not all, of Serious & Serial, has only just been released from hospital, and as the rumour mill has it, has a long few months before she’s fit to return to duty.

The Met has a long memory and is slow to forgive offenses against its people.

It gets him marked down on his psych evals.

One upside is that the way IA puts it down on paper, it looks like Justin was subbing for Erin Gray for real, and his supposed clandestine affair buys him a reprieve from the quiet - and not so quiet - mutters about John Luther, and about the bad form involved in abandoning your sub.

He lets everyone think that, and mumbles _sorry, Erin_ under his breath.

Erin Gray is better than he deserves, and it hurts in a way he can't quite name when he thinks about it. He should probably feel guilty about using an incapacitated woman to protect himself, but it buys him space and time to work, to keep catching killers, to be a good cop.

Justin thinks that maybe, Erin will understand. And then he laughs, because Erin is the antithesis of the ends justifying the means, but it's too late to take back everyone's assumptions now.

They also assume that by now, Alice Morgan has grown tired of toying with John Luther, and dumped his body off a bridge somewhere out there, never to be found, even if the investigation is still technically active.

What the fuck do they know, anyway.

*

Four and a half months later, and his siblings still have a roster up of who visits him in his apartment on what days, and, without fail, Justin forgets who’s coming and when. They bring him leftovers in clearly marked containers, each different from the other. There are square glass containers with the red plastic tops from Mum when she sends Justin home with leftovers from Sunday dinner, round ones with blue tops from David, who is learning to cook for his partner, who is a second-generation Asian immigrant, so those are full of homemade pulay. The plastic ones that look like takeout are from Olivia, who works front of a house for a fancy steak place in the City. _Eat me!!!_ is scrawled across the top of each of them. 

He's got crime scene photos spread across his kitchen counter when Charlotte lets herself in, chewing his way through his bowl of cereal, and the face that she pulls is familiar in a way that he can't describe as he makes her a cup of tea, puts it down on top of the copy of _Practical Homicide Investigation_ at her elbow.

It’s only an abduction, although a messy one, and it takes a long moment before he registers how much blood is visible along the bottom line of photos and thinks to flip them over and shove them under the small pile of procedural manuals that has taken up residence on his bench-top, the ones he keeps reminding himself to shift. 

Charlotte says she knows a nice guy, a friend of her sub's, that she could introduce him to, about half way through her tea.

It’s nothing Justin hasn't heard before - Charlotte is the one that sniffs over the dead plant on his window sill, tells him he should consider getting a flatmate, _it’s not healthy for you to come home to an empty flat, Justin, jesus, where do you relax if you've got case files everywhere? When was the last time you went down to see the football?_

Justin frowns, and puts down his coffee.

He's leaning back against the counter, and the mug skims his stomach briefly, an unpleasantly warm prickle over Spring Hill Jack's brand.

 _No,_ he says. _Not right now, Lottie._

*

Four and a half months and one week later, Justin and one of Serious & Serials new detective sergeants stop by the pub on the way home from work for a few beers, and he and Justin laugh and jostle as they walk back to the parking lot, teasing about how much the suspect had taken a shine to Leon with all his strapping domliness and polite flirtation and boy next door manners.

 _My girl's gonna be pissed I'm out this late,_ Leon says wryly. _She hold the whip much, mate?_ and Ripley laughs as Leon slaps his arm lightly. 

_Oi, don't be fucking rude,_ Leon says, but his expression is amused.

_See you in the morning, yeah?_

They part ways at the ticket machine, and Justin flicks his fingers in goodbye as Leon jogs off.

He's fumbling his car keys out of his pocket when he hears the rapid tap-tap-tap of heels coming at him, and he's half a step into turning around when something jabs into his neck, a sharp scratch of pain.

He smacks his head against the door of his car on his way down, legs giving out and the edges of his vision fuzzing out almost instantaneously. Justin can’t help but feel an edge of panic as he tastes blood on the back of his tongue where he bites the inside of his cheek, tensing as he collapses.

His last impression before he blacks out is of expensive heels and red hair, someone touching his open mouth and bottom teeth with two fingers - and Justin tries to shut his mouth, ends up with her fingertips between his lips - and a very poised female voice saying:

_What on earth are you doing out without your tags, Detective Ripley?_

_Lucky for you I know who to return you to._

*

Justin is angry at himself for being surprised at who Alice Morgan thinks he _belongs_ to.


	2. Chapter 2

Intellectually, Justin knows. There's a script you work off with dominant kidnappers, especially for submissives like him -- don't rile them, don't argue, be docile, be co-operative, make them sympathise with you, maintain your composure. Do as you're told, keep out of subspace, and bide your time. 

It worked with Pell, it's worked for other coppers, and theoretically, it should work here too. 

Four days in, Justin asks what they're demanding for him. Amnesty? A fair trial? Money? Justin tries to bargain himself out and play a little sympathy at the same time by reminding them that he is part of a community -- he has family. A big one. In fact, Charlotte's an accountant, makes a decent living, his parents and her could come up with a token amount, enough to fund their insane little jaunt for a few months, surely, because this place doesn't come cheap. 

In the moment, Justin is tied to the bed, one wrist to each end of the headboard; Alice stands against the wall, smiling, with sunlight from the window her hair. John Luther is in a chair pulled up close to the bedside, elbows on his knees, looking at Justin very seriously. 

_They couldn't afford to buy what I want for John,_ Alice says, amused. 

Luther looks over his shoulder at her, his expression pained. 

*

Justin remembers coming to in a cold, unheated car boot, bound wrist to wrist, ankle to ankle with fabric-reinforced tape. Justin remembers that just around the time he was awake enough to look for the auto-release, Alice Morgan pulled off the side of the road, came around back, and stuck him again. Justin remembers that when the car came to a final stop and the lid opened again, big hands came down and lifted the rough blanket off him. Big arms carried him into the house, gently, one arm underneath his shoulders, the other underneath his knees, like a -- 

*

It isn't a big house. His little white bedroom is next to John and Alice's. Outside, the corridor leads to the kitchen and living room area. The kitchen is square and lit from above by lights. There is a door next to it that Justin has never seen opened. More importantly, on the other side of the combined living area, there is a sliding glass door that leads to a patio. From how he came into the house, Justin believes there is a garage attached; Justin was limp and disoriented from the second dose of tranquilizers that Alice put in him, but he doesn't remember being carried up steps. Consequently, Justin believes they're on the ground floor. 

If so, the patio leads outside. Outside leads to freedom, to people who can help, to -- 

*

When Justin wakes up -- strictly speaking, wake up is the wrong term for it. Waking up implies something natural. What Justin does is surface from the haze of narcotics Alice Morgan jabs into his neck, bleary and dry mouthed and needing to piss, muscles in his left hip bunched tight from being laid on for hours straight without movement. 

Everything registers in a slow progression, muted and soft around the edges, tilting a little if Justin thinks too fast: first, they have taken his shoes, and Justin flexes his feet, notes that his toes don’t feel cold, that there’s tape around his ankles and wrists. 

Second, he is on a flat surface, a bed, a pillow under his head, sheets rumpled and warm from where someone else has been sleeping around him. It’s comfortable, more comfortable than the vague recollection Justin has of the hard chill of the car boot, and the cotton under Justin’s cheek smells masculine and familiar in a way that tickles the back of his brain. Justin is still wearing his jacket, his shirt, his pants, his socks, and the hard line of a zipper is digging into his bottom rib.

Third, there is someone touching him.

It may be the residual effects of the drugs, but there is a moment where Justin would swear he hears water sloshing about on the floor, the gradual trickle of it down the walls.

There is a moment where terror clenches down on Justin’s stomach so hard he can’t breathe as he thinks _Pell_ , thinks _Spring Hill Jack_ , thinks sewers and that John Luther has left him to die in someone else’s hands.

The hands on him are gentle, trailing long firm strokes down over his ribs to his hip, over his shirt but under his jacket. 

The last thing to register is the deep, steady voice speaking to him, the steady litany of reassurance and comfort that makes a part of Justin’s brain fuzz slightly with pleasure, resonates down to his bones, puts part of him involuntarily at ease, and Justin tries to push it away.

The first word that Justin says when he wakes up is _boss_ , and John Luther strokes his hair and says _it’s alright, Justin, everything’s going to be okay, we'll get you through this, you just need to do as you’re told._

*

Sometimes, they leave him tied on the floor while they cook and eat dinner together. Justin smells meat cooking in a hot pan. He hears the slither and splash of dried pasta being put into a pot of boiling water. Justin is tied and left in the middle of the living room floor, but if he angles his head up, he can watch Alice chop vegetables (knife, at least two and a half inches long, a weapon if he can get his hands on it), listens to John work the cork out of a bottle of white wine for their dinner (corkscrew, could be a weapon). They are trying to keep secret the geographical location of where he is being kept, so instead of having the radio on, they talk to each other. 

Otherwise, they could be two successful dominants in a fancy terrace flat in N6, and Justin could be their -- 

*

It comes back to Justin in snippets.

Whatever Alice Morgan injected him with, it didn’t stop him from seeing, absorbing information, just made the significance of it slip through his mind, unable to be grasped, the importance of the different qualities of sound from where he was in the boot, the crunching of gravel underneath the tires, the long, long sequence of turns the car had taken eluding him like water slipping through open fingers. He didn't understand at the time, but there is plenty of space afterwards to piece things together. 

He remembers voices, and blinking away the tears that were making his vision blurry. He remembers the dull thunk of the boot release activating, and the hard chill in the air, the voices getting clearer, a brief glimpse of sky, grass, fence, open space.

He remembers John Luther yawning as he ambled forward, comfortable and sleepy, and the mug of coffee dropping out of his hand as Alice let the hatch swing out of her hand to stay open on its own.

He remembers the hard clink of ceramic meeting pathway, and John Luther’s horrified _Alice, what did you do._

*

To keep his mind active, to keep from falling into subspace or any other kind of what the guides call dynamic-facilitated acceptance of his situation, Justin visualizes the sentence in the kidnapping handbook. He makes himself think of how the black lettering looked -- looks on the white page, the smell of the plastic binders, how it felt to sit in that training with the lights dimmed and the Powerpoint presentation on the wall. 

_Analysis and accurate assessment of the situation are vital to obtaining successful outcomes in abduction scenarios._

Justin forces his mind to facts. He hasn't been taken for money or amnesty or _promises_. 

John Luther claims to be trying to get Justin home, safe, in one piece, but he is the one who loops the rope around Justin's -- 

*

Point: in the pathway, John dropped his coffee mug. 

Point: Justin thinks he remembers hearing heard real anger, real shock, real horror in John's voice. He's heard those things before in John's voice. Beyond that, Justin was a copper for over a decade. He can tell, can't he, real emotion from fake pretend?

Point: The voice in his head that sometimes sounds like bossy Charlotte, sometimes like Erin Gray, sometimes like our Bets, in tears, begging for her big brother to quit being in the police force. _Justin, you didn't think he'd aided and abetted Alice Morgan. You didn't think he'd break the law. You didn't --_

Point: after hours tied up in the cold boot of a car, drugs still working their way through him, Justin can't walk. John Luther and Alice were arguing with each other, distracted. It was a chance to escape, but he barely managed to lurch part of the way into a sitting position. He was struggling to sit up the rest of the way when a shadow came over the back of the boot. Someone was talking to him, but Justin was too dazed to make out distinct words, too drugged to manage a response. His hands and ankles were still taped, so John Luther reached into the car boot and lifted him out and carried him into the house, one arm under Justin's knees, one arm under Justin's shoulders, Justin's cheek flat against John's chest like a submissive being brought home after formal collaring. 

There were even tears coming out of the corners of Justin's eyes, but Justin and John and even Alice will put it down to the drugs. 

*


	3. Chapter 3

The first month or so, after the first two or three times that Justin tries to escape, after they learn that they can't let him wander about loose, after the four days straight where they keep Justin strapped to that bed and Justin curses and kicks until he's hoarse and sore, and John sits first on that bedside chair, then moves to sitting on the cot itself and looking at him with that same solemn, sad expression when Justin jerks away from his hand stroking his shin, tells him to go fuck himself when Luther says that it's going to be okay -- 

They get into the habit of never leaving him alone. 

Sometimes, it means Justin strapped to the bed in the plain, white-walled bedroom that he is kept in most of each day. Other times, it means that he is bound, wrist to elbow, elbow to wrist, ankles to his upper thighs, thick bands of rope around each limb, sturdy knots that he hadn't known John was capable of. It's the only way he ever leaves that little room, but they take steps for his comfort. A cushion, for example, under his cheek while John reads or Alice types on the slim little laptop she has, that Justin eyes carefully, tracks the way her fingers click over the keyboard as she typed in her password, as he lies on the floor. Alice particularly likes propping her feet on him, between his shoulders or on the small of his back, digging her toes in their fuzzy socks under his wrists and rubs them against the rope around his arms or digs her heel into his ribs, the arch of her foot warm against his side. Sometimes, if she gets up to pour herself another glass of wine or to stretch, she'll balance her laptop on his shoulders. 

Out of the corner of his eyes, Justin will see, slightly blurred by movement, the red hair, the pale skin, the wide predator smile.

The warning not to tip her computer off his shoulders is implicit, but vivid. 

*

Justin remembers that Charlotte once made a joke: _our Justin, going to carry his dominant over the step_. 

The joke, being, _our Justin, service submissive_.

*

Justin remembers that while John carried him into the house, limp, tears coming out of the corners of Justin's eyes, with Alice walking behind, a little miffed that her present hadn't been entirely accepted, but pleased at what she did get: Justin remembers that she'd been holding a collar in her hand. His eyes didn't work well enough to make out the details, but he could make out the shape. 

Alice had it on hand, just in case John wanted to put the collar on his boy right then and there, while Justin was still inside the boot. 

*

John doesn't put a collar on him, though Justin knows that it's only been put away, not discarded. The first four days, they have him tied to a bed in a little white room, and Justin sees Alice put it away in the bedside table and slide it shut again. 

The collar sits, a weight in the back of Justin’s mind, a focus point in his considerations: John Luther and collars, tracking chips, Alice Morgan’s history of strange regard for the symbolism. 

It stays in the drawer, and Justin’s mind stays on it.

*

John won't let Alice strip Justin. He tugs the hem of Justin's shirt back down when she is resting her feet on his back and starts rubbing her toes up further and further on Justin's bare skin. He rebukes her gently whenever she starts looking too fascinated when he steps out of the shower, like he's a particularly interesting specimen under observation. So the rope is wrapped over the sweatpants left on his cot for him, warm and soft and folded up at the bottom so he can walk, that he's fairly sure belong to John, and the long sleeved shirt that fits surprisingly well.

It makes his stomach twist to have to dress in front of one or the other or sometimes both of them. It makes his stomach twist again to think of Alice Morgan buying him clothes, wandering through a store and browsing the racks, visualising him strapped to the bed or tied underneath her feet and picking what she wants him to wear. 

Proof, Justin thinks -- when he gets out, it’ll be proof of premeditated intent. 

Thinking about John doing it is no better, and during those evenings when his stomach is rumbling from the fact that they've had pasta or chicken or steak and Justin drank a meal replacement shake in front of Alice for lunch and hasn't had anything since and he is tied so that all he can do is breathe and his left leg is pinned underneath him and alternatively numb and cramping -- John occasionally checks on him, rumbling out _Justin, how're you doing down there?_

His hand on the back on Justin's neck, fingers stroking his throat gently. Justin doesn't answer, turns his face away every time, bites his tongue until it throbs on the urge to start screaming. 

*

What does DS Justin Ripley learn while working with DCI John Luther?

The predictability of human behaviour; how when stressed, people will act out their baseline, learned scripts of action and reaction, the perceived easiest course to restoring equilibrium to a situation. 

For example: DCI Luther is an intelligent man, with the ability to out think many of the people around him. He perceives it as a challenge, or as threatening, when he is outmaneuvered. 

Alice Morgan is a constant challenge to John Luther’s sense of equilibrium. 

Formerly, in a past life, when John Luther was still a DCI, Justin was a known variable. Predicable reactions, predictable amounts of loyalty and obedience to his boss. 

In this situation, Justin is the unknown. Factors: John Luther's departure from the Met under dubious circumstances. Previous trauma inflicted in the course of his duties - see Cameron Pell; Spring Hill Jack. The informal penance for transgressions not his own Justin has been paying since his return to work. 

The bottom of Justin's previously assumed to be endless loyalty. 

Standard operating procedure in a volatile situation is to reduce the amount of variables. Isolate problematic elements. Secure the scene, make it as safe to proceed as possible, that no bystanders will be injured, before taking further action. 

Inescapable fact: Alice Morgan cannot be made safe. Alice Morgan cannot be controlled. Alice Morgan is a predictable unpredictability. 

In this situation, Justin is the element that needs to be controlled to minimise any potential escalation.

In this situation, what does John Luther do?

*

John sits on the edge of Justin’s bed, and waits for Justin to finish cursing him, until his throat scrapes dry and catches on calling him a _son of a bitch_. Then John explains. He uses the steady tone that Justin remembers him using on people who have recently been bereaved: not the ones struck hardest by the blow, but the family friend or sister-in-law waiting with a car, who cleared his or her afternoon off. The sobbing person on the other side of the wall is in no state to answer questions about the deceased, but this person, though, is in a position to understand. Absorb. Cooperate. 

So Justin recognizes the tone. He recognizes, too, the body language, how John bends his shoulders down to Justin's level, tries to make himself less threatening by folding his large, strong body into a less-threatening package. 

What John says, though, is plain: they have no intention of killing him. He's not for ransoming, not for leverage. Justin's presence in the house was supposed to be a surprise John. A whim of Alice's, albeit a meticulously carried out one: like the hospital fire, the fake contacts, the hand over Henry Madsen’s nose - Alice does not do things by halves, no matter how horrified John Luther’s initial reaction is. 

They can't let him go, though. Alice does not want to go to jail, and will take whatever steps necessary to ensure her continued freedom. 

Justin thinks about saying that he won't tell anyone, but knows that John will make it for a lie, so he sets his mouth. 

John leans forward, just a little, in the way that encourages close listening. _She's dangerous, Justin. You have no idea._

Justin looks down at the foot of the bed, then back at John, face intent and serious as if he were asking whether the deceased had any enemies. _Does she know you talk about her that way?_

John's eyes -- Justin doesn't know how to describe it in the moment, because his throat is scraped dry, because he is a little dizzy from shouting and struggling against the ties holding his wrists to the bed, but he does something with his eyes and mouth that might be a smile. 

Later, Justin learns just how offended Alice Morgan gets when someone fails to consider her _dangerous_. 

*

In the meantime, in London, there is a suicide note that matches Justin's handwriting style and a corpse that matches his physical description.

Alice had, in her own way, been trying to make John happy. 

*

Justin marks time by his feeding schedule - in the mornings, John brings a tray, toast, coffee, orange juice. Justin is allowed to use his hands to eat. He'd asked, the first time, whether Justin preferred tea or coffee, and Justin had looked at him silently, hysterical laughter stuck in his throat, layered on top of thick, hot bile from the way his stomach had turned violently. 

For the years that Justin was Luther's DS, he fetched his coffee every morning, a medium flat white, one sugar. 

The small courtesy had made him feel sick with anger, and the look -- concerned, softness around the eyes -- on John Luther's face made it worse. 

Lunch is something that Justin sees Alice or John eating - sandwiches or a light spread, and Justin tracks the way John's eyes flick to him while he's on the floor and the vague expression of guilt, and the way Alice shakes her head at him with an amused eyebrow raise. It's clearly something they've discussed between themselves, maybe something they've bickered about and Alice has won, or something John has conceded. 

He can have water, if he asks correctly. 

The prospect of more drugs, something clear and water soluble, makes Justin's skin crawl, and most days, he doesn't ask until the last possible moment, when it's John in the kitchen, already standing by the sink. Never Alice, never when they're in another room that would involve walking past the bathroom and medicine cabinet to get to the kitchen.

This means that most days by early evening, Justin is cotton-mouthed and starving. 

John does most of the cooking. If Justin has behaved well, he gets to kneel upright on a kneeling pad, arm binder keeping his elbows close together, next to where John is doing the majority of his food prep - cutting vegetables, trimming the fat off meat. 

John offers things to be nibbled from his fingers -- carrot sticks, chunks of cheese, snowpeas -- and the disappointed noises he makes when Justin turns his head away makes Justin grind his teeth. 

A few times, he bites. 

*

One night, John loses his patience. The hand clamps down tightly, and he growls and shakes Justin by the back of the neck. 

_Give me something to work with here, Justin_. John's voice is tight, and so is his hand. _You need to give me something._

Justin is so angry at the hypocrisy that he thinks he'll choke, and two days later, he tries to escape again. This time, the consequence is that they take him down through the door that Justin noticed by the kitchen: behind it are stairs leading down. 

At the bottom, on the left, is the wine cellar. On the right is purpose-built dungeon. 

_It came with the rental_ , Alice says, sounding amused and bringing the rear while John picks his way down the stairs with Justin is draped over his shoulder. His legs won't work, and he can't even form a fist. There are tears leaking out of the corners of Justin's eyes, running down his cheeks, and there is a tranquilizer rifle propped against Alice's right shoulder. 

She is smiling. She looks happy. Pleased. The opposite of bored. 

Alice Morgan got Justin for John. She has never thought of herself as the kind of dominant who wanted to keep a house sub around. 

She is, however, beginning to see certain benefits.


End file.
